vice, throws up clouds of incense, and is removed to the crimson-canopied throne. High mass is celebrated by a cardinal and two bishops, at which he assists. During the service, the Italians seem to consider it quite as much of a pageant as foreigners, but neither a new nor an interesting one; they either walk about, and talk, or interchange pinches of snuff with each other, exactly as if it had been a place of amusement, until the tinkling of a little bell, which announces the elevation of the host, changes the scene. Every knee is now bent to the earth, and every voice hushed; the reversed arms of the military ring with an instantaneous clang on the marble pavement, as they sink on the ground, and all is still as death. This does not last above two minutes till the host is swallowed. Thus begins and ends the only part that bears even the smallest outward aspect of religion. The military now pour out of St. Peter's, and form an extensive ring before its spacious front, behind which the horse guards are drawn up, and an immense number of carriages, filled with splendidly dressed women, and thousands of people on foot, are assembled. Yet the multitude almost shrunk into insignificance in the vast area of the piazza; and neither piety nor curiosity collect sufficient numbers to fill it. The tops of the colonnades all round, how ever, are thronged with spectators; and it is a curious sight to see a mixture of all ranks and nations, from the coronetted heads of kings, to the poor cripple who crawls along the pavement, -assembled together to await the blessing of their fellow mortal. Not the least picturesque figures among the throng are the contadini, who, in every variety of curious costume, flock in from their distant mountain villages, to receive the blessing of the holy father, and whose bright and eager countenances, shaded by their long dark hair, turn to the balcony where the pope is to appear. At length the two white ostrich-feather fans, the forerunners of his approach, are seen; and he is borne forward on his throne, above the shoulders of the cardinals and bishops, who fill the balcony. After an audible prayer he arises, and, elevating his hands to heaven, invokes a solemn benediction upon the multitude, and the people committed to his charge. Every head uncovers; the soldiers, and many of the spectators, kneel on the pavement to receive the blessing. It is given with im

pressive solemnity, but with little of gesture or parade. Immediately the thundering of cannon from the castle of St. Angelo, and the peal of bells from St. Peter's, proclaim the joyful tidings to the skies. The pope is borne out, and the people rise from their knees.*

GREEK EASTER

The "Picture of Greece in 1825," by Messrs. Emerson and Humphreys, and count Pecchio, contains some particulars of the celebration of the Greek church They say,

"To-day being the festival of Easter, Napoli presented a novel appearance, viz. a clean one. This feast as the most important in the Greek church, is observed with particular rejoicings and respect. Lent having ceased, the ovens were crowded with the preparations for banquetting. Yesterday every street was reeking with the blood of lambs and goats; and to-day, every house was fragrant with odours of pies and baked meats; all the inhabitants, in festival array, were hurrying along to pay their visits and receive their congratulations; every one, as he met his friend, saluted him with a kiss on each side of his face, and repeated the words Χριστος ανεστη-Christ is risen.' The day was spent in rejoicings in every quarter; the guns were fired from the batteries, and every moment the echoes of the Palamede were replying to the incessant reports of the pistols and trophaics of the soldiery. On these occasions, the Greeks (whether from laziness to extract the ball, or for the purpose of making a louder report, I know not,) always discharge their arms with a bullet: frequent accidents are the consequence. To-day, one poor fellow was shot dead in his window, and a second severely wounded by one of these ran. dom shots. In the evening, a grand ceremony took place in the square: all the members of the government, after attending divine service in the church of St. George, met opposite the residence of the executive body; the legislative being the most numerous, took their places in a line, and the executive passing along them from right to left, kissing commenced with great vigour, the latter body em bracing the former with all fervour and affection. Amongst such an intriguing

cited the stories of the predicted death of the duke of Buckingham, in the time of Charles I., that of lord Lyttleton in later days, and many others.

Lord Bacon, who, on many points illuminated the sixteenth with the light of the nineteenth century, after referring in his chapter on prophecies (see his Essays) to the fulfilment of many remarkable fulfilments, delivers his opinion on that point in the following words :-" My judgment is, that they ought all to be despised, and ought to serve but for winter talk by the fireside. Though when I say despised, I mean for belief. That that hath given them grace, and some credit consisteth in these things. 1st. that men mark when they hit, and never when they miss; as they do, also of dreams. 2d. that probable conjectures and obscure traditions many times turn themselves into prophecies: while the nature of man which coveteth divination, thinks it no peril to foretell that, which indeed they do but collect. The 3d. and last (which is the great one) is, that almost all them, being infinite in number, have been impostures, and by idle and crafty brains, merely contrived and feigned after the event passed."

EASTER DAY.

J. W. H.

The editor is favoured with a hint, which, from respect to the authority whence it proceeds, is communicated below in its own language.

To the Editor of the Every-Day Book. Harley-street, March 22, 1826. Sir,-Before I slip from town for the holidays, let me observe that it may be useful, and more useful perhaps than you imagine, to many of your readers, if you were to mention the earliest day whereon Easter can occur: for, as not only movable feasts, but law terms, and circuits of judges, and the Easter recess of parliament, depend on this festival, it influences a vast portion of public business, and of the every-day concerns of a great number of individuals in the early season of the year.

The earliest possible day whereon Easter can happen, in any year, is the 22d of March. It fell on that day in 1818, and cannot happen on that day till the year 2285.

The latest possible day whereor Easter can happen, is the 25th of April.

As the emperor, Charles V., was passing through a small village in Arragon, on Easter-day, he was met by a peasant, who had been chosen the paschal, or Easter king of his neighbourhood, according to the custom of his country, and who said to him very gravely, “Sir, it is I that am king." "Much good may it do you, my friend," replied the emperor, "you have chosen an exceedingly troublesome employment."

NATURALISTS' CALENDAR.
Mean Temperature 43.95

...

March 27.

EASTER MONDAY.

This is the day for choosing churchwardens in the different parishes, and for merry-making afterwards

From the "Mirror of the Months."

Now, at last, the Easter week is ar. rived, and the poor have for once in the year the best of it,-setting all things, but their own sovereign will, at a wise defiance. The journeyman who works on Easter Monday should lose his caste and be sent to the Coventry of mechanics. wherever that may be. In fact, it cannot happen. On Easter Monday ranks change places; Jobson is good as sir John; the "rude mecha nical" is "monarch of all he surveys' from the summit of Greenwich-hill, ana when he thinks fit to say "it is our royal pleasure to be drunk!" who shall dispute

as

the proposition? Not I, for one. When our English mechanics accuse their betters of oppressing them, the said betters should reverse the old appeal, and refer from Philip sober to Philip drunk; and then nothing more could be said. But now, they have no betters, even in their own notion of the matter. And in the name of all that is transitory, envy them not their brief supremacy! It will be over before the end of the week, and they will be as eager to return to their labour as they now are to escape from it; for the only thing that an Englishman, whether high or low, cannot endure patiently for a week together, is, unmingled amusement. At this time, however, he is determined to try. Accordingly, on Easter Monday all the narrow lanes and blind alleys of our metropolis pour forth their dingy denizens into the suburban fields and villages, in search of the said amusement, which is plentifully provided for them by another class, even less enviable than the one on whose patronage they depend; for of all callings, the most mePancholy is that of purveyor of pleasure to the poor.

During the Monday our determined holiday-maker, as in duty bound, contrives, by the aid of a little or not a little artificial stimulus, to be happy in a tolerably exemplary manner. On the Tuesday, he fancies himself happy to-day, because he felt himself so yesterday. On the Wednesday he cannot tell what has come to him, but every ten minutes he wishes himself at home, where he never goes but to sleep. On Thursday he finds out the secret, that he is heartily sick of doing nothing; but is ashamed to confess it; and then what is the use of going to work before his money is spent? On Friday he swears that he is a fool for throwing away the greatest part of his quarter's savings without having any thing to show for it, and gets gloriously drunk with the rest to prove his words; passing the pleasantest night of all the week in a watchhouse. And on Saturday, after thanking "his worship" for his good advice, of which he does not remember a word, he comes to the wise determination, that, after all, there is nothing like working all day long in silence, and at night spending his earnings and his breath in beer and politics! So much for the Easter week of a London holiday-maker

But there is a sport belonging to

Easter Monday which is not confined to the lower classes, and which fun forbid that I should pass over silently. If the reader has not, during his boyhood, performed the exploit of riding to the turnout of the stag on Epping-forest-following the hounds all day long at a respectful distance-returning home in the evening with the loss of nothing but his hat, his hunting whip, and his horse, not to mention a portion of his nether person -and finishing the day by joining the. lady mayoress's ball at the Mansionhouse; if the reader has not done all this when a boy, I will not tantalize him by expatiating on the superiority of those who have. And if he has done it, I need not tell him that he has no cause to envy his friend who escaped with a flesh wound from the fight of Waterloo; for there is not a pin to choose between them.

EPPING HUNT

In 1226, king Henry III. confirmed to the citizens of London, free warren, or liberty to hunt a circuit about their city, in the warren of Staines, &c.; and in ancient times the lord mayor, aldermen, and corporation, attended by a due number of their constituents, availed themselves of this right of chace " in solemn guise." From newspaper reports, it appears that the office of "common hunt," attached to the mayoralty, is in danger of desuetude. The Epping hunt seems to have lost the lord mayor and his brethren in their corpcrate capacity, and the annual sport to have become a farcical show.

A description of the Epping hunt of Easter Monday, 1826, by one " Simon Youngbuck," in the Morning Herald, is the latest report, if it be not the truest; but of that the editor of the Every-Day Book cannot judge, for he was not there to see: he contents himself with picking out the points; should any one be dissatisfied with the " hunting of that day," as it will be here presented, he has only to sit down, in good earnest, to a plain matter-of-fact detail of all the circumstances from his own knowledge, accompanied by such citations as will show the origin and former state of the usage, and such a detail, so accompanied, will be inserted

"For want of a better this must do." On the authority aforesaid, and that, without the introduction of any term not in the Herald, be it known then, that before, and at the commencement of the hunt aforesaid, it was a cold, dry, and

dusty morning, and that the huntsmen of the east were all abroad by nine o'clock, trotting, fair and softly, down the road, on great nine-hand skyscrapers, nimble daisycutting nags, flowing-tailed chargers, and ponies no bigger than the learned one at Astley's; some were in job-coaches, at two guineas a-day; some in three-bodied nondescripts, some in gigs, some in cabs, some in drags, some in short stages, and some in long stages; while some on no stages at all, footed the road, smothered by dust driven by a black, bleak northeaster full in the teeth Every gentleman was arrayed after his own particular taste, in blue, brown, or black-in dress-coats, long coats, short coats, frock coats, great coats, and no-coats;-in drab-slacks and slippers;-in gray-tights, and blackspurred Wellingtons; -in nankeen bombballoons; in city-white cotton-cord unmentionables, with jockey toppers, and in Russian-drill down belows, as a memento of the late czar. The ladies all wore a goose-skin under-dress, in compliment to the north-easter.

At that far-famed spot, the brow above Fairmead bottom, by twelve o'clock, there were not less than three thousand merry lieges then and there assembled. It was a beautiful set-out. Fair dames " in purple and in pall," reposed in vehicles of all sorts, sizes, and conditions, whilst seven or eight hundred mounted members of the hunt wound in and out " in restless ectasy," chatting and laughing with the fair, sometimes rising in their stirrups to look out for the long-coming cart of the stag, "whilst, with off heel assiduously aside," they " provoked the caper which they seemed to hide." The green-sward was covered with ever-moving crowds on bot, and the pollard oaks which skirt the bottom on either side were filled with men

auo hevs.

Bu. where the deuce is the stag all this while! One o'clock, and no stag. Two o'clock, and 10 stag!-a circumstance easily accounted for by those who are in the secret, and the secret is this. There are buttocks of boiled beef and fat hams, and beer and brandy in abundance, at the Roebuck public-house low down in the forest; and ditto at the Baldfaced Stag, on the top of the hill; and ditto at the Coach and Horses, at Woodford Wells; and ditto at the Castle, at Woodford; and ditto at the Eagle, at Snaresbrook; and if the stag had been brought out before the beef, beer, bacon, and brandy, bra were

eaten and drank, where would have been the use of providing so many good things? So they carted the stag from public-house to public-house, and showed him at threepence a head to those ladies and gentle men who never saw such a thing before and the showing and carting induced a consumption of eatables and drinkables, an achievement which was helped by a band of music in every house, playing hungry tunes to help the appetite; and then, when the eatables and drinkables were gone, and paid for, they turned out the stag.

Precisely at half-past two o'clock, the stag-cart was seen coming over the hill by the Baldfaced Stag, and hundreds of horsemen and gig-men rushed gallantly forward to meet and escort it to the top of Fairmead bottom, amidst such whooping and hallooing, as made all the forest echo again; and would have done Carl Maria Von Weber's heart good to hear. And then, when the cart stopped and was turned tail about, the horsemen drew up in long lines, forming an avenue wide enough for the stag to run down. For a moment, all was deep, silent, breathless anxiety; and the doors of the cart were thrown open, and out popped a strapping four-year-old red buck, fat as a porker, with a chaplet of flowers round his neck, a girth of divers coloured ribbons, and a long blue and pink streamer depending from the summit of his branching horns. He was received, on his alighting, with a shout that seemed to shake heaven's concave, and took it very graciously, looking round him with great dignity as he stalked slowly and delicately forward, down the avenue prepared for him; and occasionally shrinking from side to side, as some supervalorous cockney made a cut at him with his whip. Presently, he caught a glimpse of the hounds and the huntsmen, waiting for him at the bottom, and in an instant off he bounded, sideways, through the rank, knocking down and trampling all who crowded the path he chose to take; and dashing at once into the cover, he was ought of sight before a man could say "Jack Robinson!" Then might be seen, gentlemen running about without their horses, and horses galloping about without their gentlemen; and hats out of number brushed off their owners' heads by the rude branches of the trees; and every body asking which way the stag was gone, and nobody knowing any thing about him; and ladies beseeching gentlemen not to